TRUMP: “WHAT A ‘STUPID’ AND UNPATRIOTIC EMBARRASSMENT FOR THE USA!”

Fri 09 December 2022:

The Biden administration’s exchange of Russian businessman Viktor Bout for imprisoned US basketball player Brittney Griner is an unpatriotic embarrassment for the United States, former President Donald Trump said on Thursday.

“What kind of a deal is it to swap Brittney Griner, a basketball player who openly hates our country, for the man known as ‘The Merchant of Death,’ who is one of the biggest arms dealers anywhere in the world,” Trump said via social media platform Truth. “What a ‘stupid’ and unpatriotic embarrassment for the USA!”

Earlier on Thursday, Russia has released US basketball star Brittney Griner in a prisoner exchange, authorities said, spurring messages of relief from US officials, supporters and Griner’s loved-ones who for months had pushed for her return to the United States.

Bout was serving a 25-year sentence in the US on arms dealing charges. Griner was sentenced earlier this year to nine years in prison in Russia for illegally bringing cannabis oil into the country.

Trump also questioned why the US did not trade Paul Whelan – a former US Marine sentenced to 16 years in Russian prison for spying – for Bout instead of Griner. Trump characterized the exchange as a “one-sided transaction.”

Russians rejected all the proposals to free Whelan, and the United States had a choice between bringing Griner home or no one at all, a senior US official told reporters on Thursday.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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